


starting point

by fatalesam (bitehard)



Category: Naruto
Genre: All consented, Fix-It of Sorts, Gen, M/M, Not Naruto Epilogue Compliant, mentions of BDSM, written just before in fact
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-16
Updated: 2017-08-16
Packaged: 2018-12-16 02:14:54
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,112
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11819097
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitehard/pseuds/fatalesam
Summary: Sasuke doesn't get everything back, but it's enough.





	starting point

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [punto de partida](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2536712) by [bitehard](https://archiveofourown.org/users/bitehard/pseuds/bitehard). 



> This was written between the last chapter of the manga and the epilogue. I really don't consider the epilogue canon even if it is, sorry. 
> 
> Anyway, hope you like it.

Sasuke never gets his hand back. 

*

Ninjutsu is always easier and more accurate when the seals are done with both hands, but it’s been some time since Sasuke learned that any technique can be just as good without one of them. It requires more strength, power and focus, but it’s possible.

He never stops training. The world is at peace but there are too many inner demons to overcome everyday; there are still thieves and killers and people who envies other people’s luck. 

There is always a job for a ninja, so Sasuke trains until he is exhausted and can sleep without dreams.

When he is on the bed and every bone is hurting and the stump burns, when he leaves the metallic leaf on the bedside table, just before he falls asleep, it’s like everything is fine. 

Sasuke gets back being a shinobi of the Leaf.

*

The official day of Eating Ramen With Your Team is set up to be on Fridays, so everyone ends up in Ichiraku. Naruto is shouting and Shikamaru is complaining and Temari smiles, indulgent, by his side. There is missing people, some on mission and some others that will not see it ever. Neji’s ghost is always near to Hinata, as if he was protecting her even after his death.

Hinata looks at Naruto. Sasuke contains his breath, sometimes, waiting for the day Naruto looks back at her the same way.

It never happens. He wants to ask, he should ask, why, but doesn’t. 

Kakashi is suddenly behind Sasuke. He has a book on his hands and he is blushing slightly.

Sometimes is like time never went by.

“You should come today”.

The shinobi with the sharingan, the shinobi of a thousand techniques, Kakashi-sensei for everyone but for him. Always smiling, even with the blood of his best friend in his hands.

Sasuke shrugs while Sakura falls from a near balcony. “Naruto knows you’re there anyway”. She sounds tired but cheerful, the mission must have gone ok, Sasuke thinks. “Are you coming, Kakashi-sensei?”

Kakashi walks near her. “Of course”.

Sasuke stays in the dark, changes his weight from one foot to the other and thinks, not today, and climbs to the roof. Naruto doesn’t look at him but smiles anyway as he knows Sasuke is looking at him from where he is, perched on the rooftop. He wraps his hands on his knees and allows only the moon to be his companion.

Sasuke gets Team Seven back.

*

Almost the whole of Konoha ended up destroyed in the war. It’s rebuilt little by little, like the house of a snail. The other villages and Kages help, too.

The Uchiha neighborhood is devastated. It’s one of the most damaged, but even if it may be something good, Sasuke’s guts clunch when he goes near it. 

Of course, nobody cares about it and doesn’t get fixed. Naruto has already told him, although he shouldn’t have, the demolition plan rumor that goes through Tsunade’s office.

He still gets treated like a ticking bomb and Naruto as the only freezer that can control him, so both of them know that at some point Naruto is going to be asked about the possibility of an uncontrolled reaction from Sasuke.

Sasuke understands it: someone can’t be on the verge of fucking up reality and then expect to be trusted.

When Naruto starts talking about fighting for it, Sasuke says “it doesn’t matter. There is nothing there mine anymore”, and Naruto’s eyes are blue, blue, blue and he has to repress the need to cover them with the hand he has left.

Even if Sasuke doesn’t tell him he wants to go say goodbye, there is no need. Naruto always knows.

He enters the place slow, discovering halfway with no surprise that he is taking the same path as eight year old Sasuke that lived the horror.

He looks up and thinks he can still see his brother’s silhouette, his face wet by tears. He can see his parents’, too, and the blood on the floor.

It would be so easy to fall into hatred again. It would be so easy that he toys with the idea for a second.

He sighs, picks up a family photo that finds in the basement, burns everything else with Naruto’s help, and leaves.

Sasuke gets himself back from the debris.

*

Sometimes he falls. Sometimes he disappears for days. Sometimes he is there but he isn’t, really. Sasuke doesn’t try to hide it because his conversation is usually so barren that almost nobody notices it. Sakura or Kakashi, from time to time. 

Sasuke knows they have sensed something when they start being careful around him. 

Naruto always notices it. As it has been happening to him all his life, he knows that now. Who has understood him beside Naruto?

He sometimes needs to be alone, and so he does, but always comes home. Sometimes he needs to cry, and so he does, covered by the pillow with his head in Naruto’s lap; Naruto’s hand in his hair, creating impossible patterns. He sometimes needs to fight, and so they do in the field inside the Nara forest that it’s just for them. Nobody can see or hear him but the tremors can be sensed in Konoha. 

He sometimes needs…

He sometimes needs just Naruto, and so he gives himself, Naruto gives him everything with no shame, he loves him and takes care of him. He gives Sasuke long nights in bed and Sasuke trusts him blindfolded and handcuffed and in pain. Other nights is Naruto who wakes up with the back full of scratches, the neck full of bruises, a smile in his face. 

He kisses him lightly in the lazy mornings. 

He gives everything away for Sasuke, as if he doesn’t need to save anything for himself.

Naruto says “yours” and Sasuke… Sasuke believes him. 

*

The warm sun flows through the window and lights up two naked bodies. One of them, with black hair, is looking up with his eyes open. The other one, blonde and a little tanner, is sleeping almost on top of him, he has a scar-filled hand in his chest.

Sasuke moves his hand to Naruto’s face and moves away his fringe. Naruto wakes up, looks up to him and kisses his jaw.

“Hey, you’re with me, aren’t ya?”

He thinks “always”. He thinks “until hell freezes over”. He thinks “there is no other place for me to be”.

He says: “Shut up and sleep”.

Naruto smiles as if he has heard everything anyway, and falls asleep in a minute.

*

Sasuke thinks “I got Naruto back” but, really, he knows he never lost him.


End file.
